Packard Foundation Names Its First Director of Justice and Equity Grant Making

David and Lucile Packard Foundation

Katherine Wheatle will be the inaugural director of its justice and equity grant making, where she will steer $70 million in remaining funding from the foundation’s initial $100 million commitment in 2020 to address anti-Black racism in the United States.

She comes to Packard from the Lumina Foundation where she served as strategy officer for federal policy and racial equity.

Robin Hood

Matthew Klein has joined the antipoverty organization as its chief program and impact officer.

For the past seven years, Klein has worked under former Mayor Bill de Blasio as executive director of the New York City Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity.

Timken Foundation of Canton

Bob Timken, a partner at Carmony Development, will be the next president of his family’s foundation.

He succeeds his father, Ward (Jack) Timken. Jack Timken led the foundation for more than 40 years, during which time he directed more than $400 million in grants to organizations in Ohio.

More New CEOs

Evie Hantzopoulos, who was most recently executive director of Global Kids, has been tapped as executive director of the Queens Botanical Garden. She succeeds Susan Lacerte, who retired in September after 27 years of leadership.

Amie Shei, vice president for programs at the Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts, has been promoted to president and CEO, effective in the spring. She will follow Jan Yost, who has led the foundation since its inception in 2000 and will retire this year.

Peter Stinson, executive director of Greater Harleysville and North Penn Senior Services, has been appointed executive director of the Twilight Wish Foundation.

Felicia Swoope will be the next executive director of Newark Arts. A former dancer and producer, she most recently worked at Dartmouth College as assistant director of admissions recruiting for the Tuck School of Business and diversity, equity, and inclusion strategist at Artivism, a digital platform for Dartmouth students and faculty. She succeeds Jeremy Johnson, who left to become the first president and CEO of Cleveland’s Assembly for the Arts.

Ava Willis-Barksdale, associate vice president for advancement at Ursinus College, has joined Lincoln University as vice president for institutional advancement and executive director of the Lincoln University Foundation.

Emira Woods, a consultant on human rights and environmental justice as well as a senior adviser at the Shine Campaign, will be the next executive director of the Green Leadership Trust.

Other Notable Appointments

Debra Ann Byrd, founder of the Harlem Shakespeare Festival, has been named artistic director of the Southwest Shakespeare Company.

Ryan Carter has been tapped as manager of finance and administration at the Foundation for Child Development. Most recently he was finance manager and acting human-resource manager at the Future Leaders Institute Charter School.

Michael Frazier has been named chief communications officer at America250, a nonprofit group that is working with the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission to plan a commemoration of America’s 250th anniversary in 2026. Until last year, he was executive vice president and deputy director of external affairs at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum.

Jodie Gates will be the next artistic director at the Cincinnati Ballet. She was the founding director of the University of Southern California’s Glorya Kaufman School of Dance and artistic director and founder of the Laguna Dance Festival.

Kelly Huber, senior director of community investments at the Community Foundation for Southern Arizona, has been promoted to vice president for philanthropy.

Monica Keith, executive director of advancement operations and prospect development at Skidmore College, has been named vice president for advancement at Knox College.

Dwayne Linville, director of operations at the Shine Campaign, has been named director of grant making operations at the William T. Grant Foundation. Melissa Wooten has also joined the foundation as a program officer, where she will oversee the William T. Grant Scholars and Mentoring grants programs. Most recently she was associate vice president for academic equity within the Division of Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement at Rutgers University.

Janneke Ratcliffe has been promoted from associate vice president to vice president of the Urban Institute’s Housing Finance Policy Center.

Ramya Rauf, chief financial officer at YWCA Minneapolis, has joined the Northwest Area Foundation as vice president of finance and administration and chief financial officer. She replaces Millie Acamovic, who recently retired after 14 years there.

Drew Wilburne has joined the Kansas Health Foundation as director of policy and outreach. Most recently he worked in the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services as director of intergovernmental affairs.

Departures

Danielle Holly will step down as CEO of Common Impact on February 18. She has worked there for 15 years, including 10 years as its leader.

Kevin Ryan, president and CEO of Covenant House International, plans to retire on March 31, 2023. He has served in the top role since 2009.

Marvin Schotland, the longtime president and CEO of the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles, will step down at the end of this year. Since he took the reins in 1989, the foundation’s assets have grown from $90 million to $1.5 billion.

Legacies

Clyde Bellecourt, a civil-rights leader from the White Earth Nation, died from cancer on January 11 at age 85. In 1968, he co-founded the American Indian Movement, which began in Minneapolis to protest police brutality and discrimination against Native people. It later grew into a larger activist movement that led the 1972 Trail of Broken Treaties march on Washington and the Wounded Knee Occupation in South Dakota in 1973. He retired in 2020.

Louis Simpson, a philanthropist and investor who managed Geico’s investment portfolio, died on January 8 at age 85. Along with his second wife, Kimberly Querrey, the couple gave many notable gifts to his alma maters. To Northwestern University, from which Simpson graduated in 1958, they gave a total of $250 million, including $92 million in 2015 for a new biomedical research center at its Feinberg School of Medicine and $15 million in 2020 for the Simpson Querrey Institute for Epigenetics. To Princeton University, they donated $20 million in 2016 for a new building to house the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies and $10 million in 2015 to establish its Center for the Study of Macroeconomics. He earned a master’s degree in economics from Princeton in 1960 and worked there as an instructor for several years.

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